Stay
by CasiNight
Summary: Gaby's gone. Illya wants to leave, too. Can Napoleon convince him to stay? No slash. Just the beginning of a powerful friendship.


**Hello. I am normally a Hawaii Five-O author, but this just happened about a week ago. I've been fighting with myself over whether or not to post it, and I finally decided to.**

 **I write the original series stories for my sister, but this is my first story for the movieverse. It it receives pleasant reviews, maybe I'll write more. ;)**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own _The Man From U.N.C.L.E._ or it's characters. I wish I did. Illya is precious and Napoleon is charming. **

**ENJOY!**

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"Peril!" The shout barely permeated the sound of the revving airplane that Illya Kuryakin was walking towards. Turning around, he saw his partner, Napoleon Solo standing there, hands tucked in his pockets as he sauntered lazily towards his partner. Where he had come from, the Russian didn't know, but Solo had a habit of appearing out of nowhere. Finally, he came up to stand in front of the tall man, the height difference becoming apparent when he almost had to look up at him. "Where are you going?"

Kuryakin looked at him, his eyes guarded. "Home," he said.

Solo nodded, leaning over to look around his partner at the plane waiting, before standing back up straight. "Home meaning Russia?"

Illya nodded. "Da." He looked down at the shorter man, a smile creasing his lips. "Are you going to miss me, Cowboy?"

Solo smiled, looking down at the tarmac. He didn't look back up as he said, "Of course not."

Kuryakin's smile faded somewhat and he nodded, beginning to turn towards the plane. "Goodbye, Cowboy."

"Illya."

The Russian froze, turning back towards this man that he had met a mere 6 months ago. At the time, they had been trying to kill each other, but they hadn't and suddenly they were partners, trading places with the villains that they chased. Instead of pointing guns at each other's backs, they were watching them. It was an odd juxtaposition to happen. But now it was time to leave, to move on. Illya Kuryakin was going back to Russia and there was nothing that was going to change that . . . almost nothing.

Looking over his shoulder, he saw the American agent take a step forward, his eyes no longer guarded like they normally were. Instead, they were incredibly raw, emoting something that the Russian hadn't expected to see when it came to him. Sadness. Fear. But why would he feel those things for him.

"Illya . . . Stay. Please. Don't leave."

Kuryakin sighed. "Why?" For a simple, monosyllabic word, it encompassed everything that had passed in those 6 months.

Napoleon floundered for words, trying desperately to respond with something. "Gaby. Think of what this will do to her. You two grew quiet close."

Illya shook his head, taking a step backwards towards the plane, widening the gap between the partners. "She left; said that she couldn't do it anymore. She wanted to start a family, and I . . ." He shook his head, looking down at the ground.

"The agency will suffer." Napoleon said quickly, taking a small step towards the Russian.

"The agency will live." His English had gotten better in the 6 months that they had been working together, but his accent was still very thick.

Napoleon watched the man turn away once more and panic took over for the first time in his life. Peril was right, Gaby had left and they were the only ones left of their little team. Illya didn't like to talk about it, but Solo knew that she had wanted to start a family with the Russian, but said man wasn't ready to settle down. This had nearly destroyed the poor man as she had decided to leave without him then. It was cruel, actually, but the last thing Solo wanted to do was judge. "I will suffer."

Illya froze mid-step, shoulders hunched as he slowly turned, inch by inch, until he was facing the American. The walls in his eyes were crumbling and, as he looked at his partner, he felt something inside of him shift. "What?" The word seemed so stupid to say and he felt pretty foolish, but he needed to make sure that he had heard the man correctly. He hoped that he had.

"I . . . will suffer." Napoleon said, his eyes pained at he glanced back at the plane behind his partner . . . his friend. "Illya . . . You're all I have left. I-," he took a breath, glanced at the ground, before looking back up, and said, "I need you."

Illya's breath caught in his throat. Someone needed him. Illya had never been needed in his life. No one had ever wanted to see him, wanted to be around him, or even wanted to say hi in passing in the hallway. And here this capitalist was, saying that he needed him: a communist that had tried to kill him in their first meeting.

Smirking, Solo added, "And you need me, too."

Illya smiled, waving a hand in the air to signal the plane to take off, before taking a step towards his partner. Pursing his lips, he looked at the sky. "This is not the Russian way, Cowboy."

Napoleon shrugged. "Maybe I'm rubbing off on you."

There was no need to voice the fact that by going back to Russia, there was a high chance that Illya would've been killed for treason and that Napoleon would have been sent back to the CIA which would then send him on the most difficult mission they had in the hopes that he would get killed. It was an unspoken thing that by staying together, they were staying alive, but the implicit idea was that they weren't staying together to stay physically alive. In those 6 months, something akin to friendship had developed and there was no denying that it was growing stronger by the day.

As they walked back to his car, Napoleon thought about what he had said those many months back when he had been looking at Illya through the rear window of Gaby's car. _"It just doesn't seem like the right thing to do."_ Somewhere in his subconscious, had he known that he and Kuryakin would become partners on more than just paper, but also in relationship . . . that they would experience the closest friendship either of them had ever had?

Kuryakin wondered the same thing. He could've easily killed Solo back in that park bathroom, but he for some reason had held back. Was this the reason? Had he sensed a kindred spirit from the start? It was possible.

Whatever it was, they were going to continue on this roller coaster of partnership that they had, wherever it led them.

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 **How was it? I hope it was alright. I loved the movie and I really want to do it justice. Now I just hope that there will be a second movie! Please tell me with a review, what you thought, and maybe I'll write more. Have a great rest of the week.**

 **P.S. To all of those waiting for the next installment of Fight Club, I apologize. The plot bunny is rabid and bit me. I thought it was nothing serious, so it wasn't treated. This is the infection.**


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